Hey there, tech fiends. It's that time of the week again. Before we dive into today's focus, here's the usual weekly reminder that if you're looking for even more sick bands to hear, all prior editions of this series can be perused here.
Newcomers Hammer of Dawn will be releasing their debut effort, Ketor at the end of the month on May 28th with the help of Blood Blast Distribution. I'm excited to help the group premiere "The Palace of the Kantus" today which you can either immediately scroll down and jam or read on to learn more about Hammer of Dawn and Ketor.
Videogames and metal music have long been intertwined, so I'm all for groups drawing inspiration from that medium in order to center their music's lyrical focus around something not entirely overdone as far as done to death metal tropes go. Hammer of Dawn leans way into that sort of synergy, immersing their music entirely within the lore and world of Gears of War. Although I'm not much of a gamer anymore, Gears of War is a great series and definitely feels like ripe territory to draw inspiration from when it comes to death metal. So with all that explained, we can get down to how damn good "The Palace of the Kantus" and Ketor as a whole is.
It certainly helps the profile of Hammer of Dawn that powerhouse vocalist Mac Smith (Krosis, Necropathy, and now Alterbeast) and Aborted (also Hideous Divinity) bassist Stefano Franceschini are a part of the lineup. Although that wouldn't mean all that much if the rest of the musicians weren't equally adept, as they most certainly are. As far as "The Palace of the Kantus" goes, it's a somewhat "blackened" and orchestral laced take on tech-death with just the right amount of heaviness spliced within it's depths. It's probably my favorite song on Ketor and out of all three possible singles, I specifically asked to premiere this one given the strength of this single. If that means anything to anyone of course.
As usual, I asked if I could get a statement about the song being premiered and Hammer of Dawn kindly shared with us that “The Palace of the Kantus’ is the next evolution into our aspiring blackened sound. While each of us are deeply influenced and rooted within death metal and its various subgenres, this single initiates our transition towards the style that we aim to progress into our project’s compositional maturity. If you’ve had a chance to listen to both previous singles, the difference in our artistic approach becomes quite evident. Collectively, this is our favorite track that we’ve composed on this debut record and we’re very proud of it. We would like to thank everyone who has supported us during our project’s launch and we hope you enjoy our third and final single before Ketor’s release on May 28!”
So be sure to check out "The Palace of the Kantus" below. Pre-orders can be placed through Bandcamp for those interested. You can follow the group on Facebook.
